Comprehensive Guide to Gearing up Alternate Characters in Module 14

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I guess you know the following situation. You’ve established a main, brought it to endgame territory, and then want to try out a new play style. Are you “bis” and simply ran out of things to do? Or maybe you realize you have trouble getting into groups because you’re not being part of the meta? In all cases you obviously start a new character, a so-called “alt” or “alternate” one. Other MMOs refer to this as mules sometimes, because they typically are simply used as extended inventory space to store items. This and other ways to utilize alts can be found here by the way.

But this article will only deal with level 70 alts you actually plan to play with (for leveling purposes you can look up this guide, which also lists shortcuts you can take). When players bring up alts, they normally are not eager to go through the full gearing process again. Gladly you don’t have to, because with an established main you can supply many items that bind to account directly to your alts. Your main basically becomes the starting point in terms of item progression. You will also normally have a little more ADs to buy stuff compared to brand-new players.

Cheap ones from the Auction House for your street credibility (aka item level). Depending on how “finished” you want your character, you could also look up the stuff you’ll eventually need. Some specific pets are expensive, others reasonably priced.

Companions from the Trade Bar store. Only pick up those that fit the build long-term.

Account unlocked promotion companions. If you own some of those, it’s a no-brainer to claim them with your alts.

Mounts

Account unlocked ZEN Mounts are your first choice when it comes to equipping alts. If you have some available, get them into your stable.

It’s unfortunately not a great time to get Mounts for a bargain on the AH. Check running events, because a lot of those offer Mounts as prize for participating. Some even bind-to-account, which means you can farm on you main. You can also look up this guide that lists other available sources. In case you plan to throw ADs at expensive Mounts, make sure you can use them long-term.

Buy blue Insignias from the Auction House for your street credibility (aka item level). It doesn’t hurt to get Insignias and Insignia Bonuses you actually need. Most blue ones are reasonable priced so you shouldn’t run into any trouble.

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As you can see, in contrast to our guide for bringing up new characters, you have a lot more options and your general item level starting point is a little higher. All of the stuff can either be bought or farmed with your main. So ideally you already have all the items available when setting up your alt and have to do little to no grinding on the new toon. An additional idea of the initial gearing process is to get the setup as close as possible to the final build (in case you aim for one). That way tweaks down the road shouldn’t be major. In that regard also make sure you’ve read this article about the importance to build around Armor Penetration.

Next Steps

In terms of gear you’re able to pretty much bring alts from zero to hero within a short amount of time, but it’s not equally easy with campaigns. The above setup is decent, but shouldn’t boost a character over 11,000 item level unless you have a huge surplus of refining points and can get your Artifacts and Artifact Gear to a higher level than purple. So you still need to do some campaigns and grab boons before you’re truly endgame ready.

I’m a huge fan of grabbing the Campaign Buyout Bundle from the ZEN Market at one of those major 40% sales. If you have the currency it means you can set up a character in the 13-14k range instantly. Otherwise you obviously have to do the grind yourself. Depending on what you’re trying to achieve, lower item levels might already do by the way. 11k-12k is more than enough to perform basic Salvage farming or similar for example.

As you can see, it’s not terribly difficult to set up a basic yet potent alternate character with items that mains can supply or buy. The devs have done a decent job over the last couple of modules by introducing a variety of account bound gear to enhance alt play. It definitely shows as alternate characters are that much easier to bring up than new ones. There’s still some grind involved, but a well set up alt can definitely get into the action at level 70 right away!

Are you an altoholic? What’s your basic setup of gear whenever you bring up a new toon? Share your thoughts and experience on our social channels, in the comments below, or visit our message board!

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j0Shi

j0Shi plays the Neverwinter MMORPG since the open BETA in 2013 and is a regular contributor to the blog and the whole UN:Project. Originally a Guardian Fighter, he has built up ALTs of all classes and plays on BIS/near-BIS level.

7 thoughts on “Comprehensive Guide to Gearing up Alternate Characters in Module 14”

Because 10,000+ Zen per SINGLE CHARACTER is a rip-off. So is 5000+ Zen in a 50% Sale.

With a party of skilled players, it is possible to do FBI at 13k with Boons only up to WoD, excluding EE and Maze Engine.

Now, if they made an Account-Wide Unlock of all campaigns for 10,000 Zen, I may buy it. Even if it were 20,000 Zen, I would be interested (in a 50% Sale) as long as it was ACCOUNT-WIDE, like my Epic Zen mounts. So all characters I create in the future can claim.

Note, I have never exploited or hacked, never been banned, never had currencies removed by Cryptic and never insisted on Greed/Speed Runs and then kicked people just before the loot role. So my view of in-game finances and value for money may differ from some people’s. I did not exploit 20 million AD per day with Astral Resonators or Hunts, nor did I exploit 30 million RP per day.

All my AD goes on AD Sinks, except for the UES I some times buy. So If I am going to spend £100 on Zen, I will spend it only on something I feel is worth the money.

Yes, I heard it can take more than 100 days to complete SKT. Is that right? Over 3 months? But again, for 3000 Zen I’d want an account-wide unlock. I’ve not had a main since Mod 8, so all my characters are Alts. I used to have Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Alts, but now I have Alts I like and Alts I don’t like so much.

So you have this new high geared toon as an “alt”, but zero idea how to play it. Yes I have done much as listed above as Barovia opened and I’ve passed gear about so that all of my toons sit at a good “Street Cred” (must say I do like that terminology), but I have played every single one of my girls all the way up to 70 through all the campaigns so I know how to run them. Getting geared isn’t everything, knowing your class is more important.

Learning a new class in Neverwinter and when to use powers etc will only take you 1-2 weeks. It is not a difficult game. Case by case testing everything for that class will take 1-2 months, but you don’t need to do that to be able to play it, in fact, I am sure only 1-2 people for every class would ever do that. Were I to play a new class at this point, I would just buy the campaigns, because I really don’t care to run through them again.

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